


When The Doctor Becomes the Patient

by Tom_Tomorrow



Category: Chicago Med, Chicago PD (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-10-29
Packaged: 2018-07-28 14:13:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7644064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tom_Tomorrow/pseuds/Tom_Tomorrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A late night, incoming trauma patient becomes personal when the staff of Chicago Med realize that the victim is one of their own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

When The Doctor Becomes the Patient

 

“911 call reported a 245, possible 211, on Jefferson street. Available officers please respond.”

Assault with a deadly weapon.

Possible robbery.

The clock reads quarter past midnight. Just fifteen minutes left on her shift.

Except crime doesn’t work in shifts.

And Jefferson is only three blocks away.

“This is Officer Burgess. En route.”

The sirens blare on.

Roman would have to wait.

“Oh thank god! I didn’t know what to do! I think the guy who-“

A pock-marked lanky teenager bombards her with information as soon as the squad car pulls up.

“Hey! Calm down. Calm down. What happened?”

“I-I work at the theatre and I was taking out the trash…”

He leads her around the back entrance of the movie theatre into a dark, poorly lit alley.

“… and I found her just sitting there. I didn’t know what to do.”

Burgess hears her before she sees her.

A soft hiccuping accompanied with unsteady breathing.

And then she sees a figure sitting, leaning against the bricks. 

A small woman.

White. Mid twenties.

Her face is hidden beneath a mass of curly brown hair.

The red, the three growing splotches of crimson spreading through her plaid shirt, are not.

Burgess opens the radio line to the station.

“This is Officer Burgess. Requesting 11-41. We need an ambulance at the Jefferson Cinemax immediately.”

She gets down on her knees. Becomes level with the girl shaking on the ground.

“Miss? I’m Officer Burgess. Can you tell me your name?”

No response.

“Hey Officer. I already tried that. I don’t think-“

She holds up a hand to silence the boy. 

Shines a flash light to get a better view at the injuries.

Comes face to face with eyes.

Dark eyes. 

Very dark, very cloudy eyes.

Staring straight ahead. Staring straight through her.

Another soft hiccup.

More stagnated breathing.

More red. 

And very familiar eyes.

Oh my God. 

“Reese?”

 

—

 

April expertly slides the IV into the patient’s sweaty skin as he smiles drunkenly down at her. 

“Whoa dude that’s awesome man! And kind of hot…”

His friend grins stupidly.

Makes a vulgar gesture with his hand.

“Keep it in your in your pants, gentlemen. You should be sobered up in no time.”

Gives them a quirky half smile, slides the curtains closed behind her.

It’s half past midnight.

The majority of patients that came in the early weekend morning were often consequences of alcohol consumption. 

Slurring and stumbling into the ER. Barely able to walk in a straight line.

Nothing they said could be taken too seriously. 

She stifles a yawn as she rounds the corner, directly into Dr. Choi.

“Whoa there April. Tired already? Your shift’s barely started!”

Smirking, April easily maneuvered around him. 

“I’m eight hours in, thank you very much. You’re not looking to hot yourself, Ethan.”

“Psh. I just started my shift!”

The remainder of what he says disappears into the background as she continues forward. 

Maggie waves hastily from the nurses station when she enters the main area.

“Incoming trauma patient. Dr. Rhodes. Halstead. April. You’re on it.”

A flurry of activity occurs as the team gets ready for the incoming patient.

Scrubs. Masks. Sanitizer.

By the time the team organizes themselves the blue and red twirling lights are slowing to a stop .

The chaos inside evidently having only just begun.

The doors swing open and the paramedic is already rattling off information.

“Female. Mid Twenties. Stab wounds. Three to the abdominal pelvic cavity. One to the lower arm.”

Blood pressure.

Pulse oximetry.

Pupil dilation. 

A stretcher is lifted out of the ambulance. Down to the doctors. 

Rhodes is there first.

Reaching for the penlight to check the patient’s pupils.

Then he double takes.

Visibly falters.

“Oh my God. It’s Reese.”

Reese?

Everyone seems to pause for half a second as that registers.

Fourth year medical student Reese. 

Their Reese.

All of a sudden it’s personal.

“Wait. What the fuck happened?”

It’s Halstead. More fury in his tone than April’s heard in a while. 

The paramedic shrugs. Says something else. Something about cops.

But April doesn’t hear.

She’s too busy pressing gauze pads against the smaller girl’s wounds.

Too busy listening to Rhodes speak to Reese. 

Listening to Rhodes try to get her talking as he checks her over.

Because she’s still conscious. 

Not lucid.

As she slurs unintelligibly.

Just conscious.

Crimson is bleeding through everything April puts on it.

Torso wounds tend to bleed a lot.

April’s eyes water.

Then Halstead is there forcefully, purposely pushing her away.

“Shit! April. We need more O positive. She’s losing more than we’re putting in. Get her medical records too!”

Frustration is replaced by determination.

Reese isn’t going to die today.

… ….

“Maggie! I need Reese’s medical records.”

The charge nurse looks up from the nurses station, not expecting April to be back so quickly.

Not understanding the situation. 

“Why would you need-?”

She sees the impatience and desperation in the other nurse’s eyes.

Then looks behind her. Sees the patient being wheeled in.

Halstead shouting for an operating room. 

Rhodes working furiously against to the crimson that’s starting to dot the floor. 

“Maggie I need them now!”

She wheels back to computers, types in a few keys, and the information pops up.

Her allergies.

Her immunizations.

And in the top right corner her ID photo.

Bright and youthful.

“What happened?”

Maggie forces herself to remain calm and disassociated.

Because if she puts any more emotion into it, she’ll have to admit what she refuses to believe. 

April only nudges her aside, scanning the information, printing it for Connor, Halstead, and the rest of the medical team to look at.

“April! What happened?”

“She was stabbed Maggie. Four times.”

Four times.

Who fucking stabs someone four times?

She looks at the hallway that they’ve gone down .

Looks back at the ID photo.

Tries to reconcile the two.

And as soon as the documents are printed April is gone. 

Another nurse looks over sympathetically. 

“Sarah’s strong. She’ll pull through.”

Maggie nods.

She’ll pull through. 

She will pull through.

Maggie looks back at the file.

Reese’s emergency contacts needed to be called.

… ….

“Shit! There’s two bleeders. Somebody give me suction!”

Rhodes is hands deep in her abdominal cavity.

Somewhere he’d never wished he had to be.

He just thanks the stars it’s not the thoracic cavity.

A punctured pancreas and a partially lacerated small intestine are easier to fix than a punctured lung or heart.

It doesn’t this mean that this isn’t bad.

It is bad. 

Some bastard did this to her.

Stabbed her and left her for dead.

Reese looks so small on the operating table.

So fragile.

But no. 

He can’t focus on who she is to him.

That’s an unnecessary distraction.

He has to focus on fixing her.

Making her whole again.

Halstead is next to him.

Repairing the damage done to her arm.

Connor can practically feel the fury radiating off of him.

…

The phone rings at half past one.

Doctor Daniel Charles has half a temptation to ignore it.

He hasn’t been sleeping well lately.

Long days.

Even longer nights.

And he has an early shift tomorrow.

But he sees the caller ID.

Chicago Med.

It must be important.

“This is Dr. Charles speaking.”

“Sorry for calling this late. But you need to come down as soon as you can.” 

A twinge of annoyance springs up.

But he’s more worried by the tone of melancholy that has a rooted presence in the charge nurse’s voice. 

So much so that he’s already out of bed, buttoning up his shirt, looking for his suit jacket.

He checks his pager.

Nothing. 

“I’m not the psychiatrist on call tonight Maggie, but why didn’t you just page me?”

There’s a beat of silence over the phone.

The pause is short but heavy.

“It’s not a psychiatric call. It’s Reese. You’re the number listed as her emergency contact.”

Dread and confusion hit him at once.

“I’m her emergency contact? Never mind. I’m on my way.”

It’s only after he's exited his house that he realizes he hadn’t even asked what was wrong.

……..

Will tears off his crimson stained gloves.

Rips off his mask.

Takes a long look at Connor’s red soaked scrubs and storms away from the now silent operating room.

The surgery takes three hours. 

It’s touch and go for a while. 

They have to put through almost three bags of blood.

Stabilize her more than twice.

And each time he looked at her on that table, he thinks how horribly ironic this is.

How ironic that the doctor has become the patient.

How Reese has spent the last few months learning to become an incredible doctor under their watch and now she lies, very literally, under his own hands.

Bleeding out on the very table that she would have stood over to help save lives.

He thinks my god don’t let her die on my hands. 

Don’t let her die here.

But Reese is going to make it.

Be back on her feet within a week or two.

She’s going to be fine. 

But the uneasy feeling still rests on the staff that know her personally.

His own fury has yet to be quelled. 

Because they still don’t know why.

They still don’t know what bastard would take a knife and do that to anyone, much less Reese.

Their Reese.

They all take shifts checking on her, in between their other patients.

April and Charles stay there the longest, considering both their shifts are either over or won’t start for a good while.

Will stays away.

His suppressed anger is barely staying under wraps.

Who? Why? Who?

He doesn’t know what will happen if he sees Reese in that hospital bed.

So he leaves Connor to look at the charts.

Distracts himself with other patients who don’t look like the friend he just operated on.

By seven, two cops are there.

Lindsay and Burgess. 

They express their sympathies. 

Say that they just need to ask her a few questions when the drugs wear off.

Then say Reese’s attack might have something to do with other assaults in the area. 

Which doesn’t serve to quell his fury.

Only adds fuel to that fire.

Because that only means someone is getting their rocks off by stabbing women and leaving them in the streets. 

By eight, he works up the nerve to check up on her in the hospital room.

But, Reese still hadn’t woken up.

So he goes to the on-call room.

Lets his anger fester there.  
……………

Waking up after a trauma doesn’t happen like it happens in the movies.

This is one of the first things Doctor Natalie Manning realizes when she becomes a medical professional. 

No sudden starts.

No ripping off electrodes. 

No tearing out of the IVs.

Nothing of that variety.

Mostly just silent, painful confusion. 

The pediatrician stops by after her first set of rounds.

She missed the frenzy of what occurred in the early morning hours. 

Didn’t even know what had happened until she ran into Will in the on call room.

Listened to his angry rant full of expletives and hate aimed at some nameless bastard before he even mentioned Reese’s name. 

While she wasn’t very close too Reese. 

Knew very little about her outside of a hospital setting. 

Natalie was still very fond of her. 

Because she had been Reese once.

A scrambling med student trying to find validation with some full fledged doctors.

So when she leans against the entrance to the hospital room and sees what some stranger has reduced such a promising young women into…

She wants to scream.

The curly haired brunette looks small in that hospital bed, the machines looming over her as they press against the corner.

Covered in bandages, electrodes, and darkly colored bruises.

April is asleep, curled up in the guest chair, directly next to her.

Doctor Charles occupies the only other chair.

He rises when she steps into the room.

“You can take my seat Natalie.”

He looks so tired, so worn out, so much so that she almost protests, but the psychiatrist is already objecting.

“My shift starts soon and I have an inkling that April won’t be giving up her spot anytime soon. She’s been here since her shift ended.”

Natalie nods in appreciation, then notices the bags under his eyes.

“How long have you been here, Daniel?”

The psychiatrist pauses at the door.

“Maggie called me in around half past one.”

That man offers no further explanation as he looks at the broken girl in the hospital bed and reluctantly disappears down the hall.

And Natalie is left listening to the breathing.

The breathing of April, of Sarah, of the machines.

Twenty minutes pass this way.

Then a flicker of movement catches the corner of her eye.

Natalie sits up straighter, looks at Reese 

A shaky, sudden inhalation.

And the curly haired brunette’s eyes snap open. 

The pediatrician sees the fear in her eyes and moves quickly before the med student tries to get up.

“Hey, hey. It’s alright Sarah. It’s alright. You’re in the hospital now.”

The petrified glint in those dark hooded eyes don’t go away.

“N-Natalie…”

Her name comes out in a raspy whisper if she can even call it that. 

Natalie nods her affirmation.

Moves over so Reese can see her clearly.

Grabs her chart on the way.

Because even if she’s not the attending physician, she’s damn well going to check on her friend.

“I’m here. Sarah, do you remember what happened?”

Reese does that thing.

That thing she does when she’s nervous or confused.

Tilts her head. 

Scrunches her brow.

“I… I…”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to say anything now.”

Natalie checks her pupillary response.

Moves to record her vitals.

“I… I got…”

“Reese.”

She’s getting herself worked up.

And that’s never good for a patient just out of surgery. 

“I got… He.. He stabbed me.”

There’s a note of hysteria there.

Confirmed by the sudden spike in beeps.

“Reese. Can you calm down for me? I need you to stay calm.” 

She isn’t listening.

“Oh my God…” she groans. “Oh my God…”  
April wakes in the commotion.

Sees what’s happening and roles into action.

The stitches can’t tear,

“I g-got… H-he stabbed me. He stabbed me.”

She’s repeating it like a mantra.

Over and over again.

Hysteria increasing in presence each time.

“Reese. Reese! Look at me. It’s me, April. I need you to look at me honey.”

Natalie’s silently relieved when Reese’s terrified, tear filled, eyes tear away from her and focus on April.

“I can’t… I can’t… I can’t! 

The pediatrician forcefully keeps Reese’s hands away from her torso as she struggles.

“Yes, you can. Look at me. Just look at me.”

But the younger girl only looks away.

“I want.. I want you to let go of me. Get off me! Please!”

“Okay, we’ll let go, but first you gotta calm down. Now you can look at me. Or look at Natalie. But you gotta look at one of us first.”

While April talks Reese down, Natalie concerns herself with the stitches.

Making sure they haven’t torn.

Making sure they’ve started the healing process.

The curly haired brunette groans loudly when she does.

“Reese. Look at me. At me. Okay?”

“H-he tried to k-kill me April.”

Natalie watches April bite her lip, avert her eyes away for the briefest seconds to blink away the tears and steady her voice. So Natalie takes over.

“You’re safe here, Reese. Nobody’s going to get to you in here.”

Reese draws in an unsteady breath, but the tears streaming down her face betray any semblance of calm.

“You’re safe Reese. You’re going to be fine.”


	2. Chapter 2

She only sees the knife. 

She notices the gloved hand that wields it.

The masculine silhouette that threatens her.

The alley that he’s pushed her into.

But she really only sees the knife.

How big it is.

How sharp.

And all she hears is the blood rushing through her ears in beat with her thumping heart as she fumbles for her wallet.

Because that’s what he must want.

Money.

Instead he backs her further into the alley.

Further from the street.

And she watches the grip tighten on the knife. 

No longer hesitant. Definitely sure. 

And when he shoves her against the wall.

She realizes that he doesn’t want her money.

He wants something much worse.  
… … … … …. … …. ….  
April’s been up for twenty four hours.

Finished her twelve hour shift, then stayed up through this entire fiasco.

And there was no way she could find it in herself to get a goodnight’s rest after they wheeled her in.

Not in the way that required a bed anyway.

Just cat naps on the chair.

Something she’s perfected through her years as a nurse.

It takes April time to calm Sarah down. 

To convince her that everything is going to be okay.

She has to get down on the medical student’s level, disengage the hospital bed barriers, and physically sit next to her. 

“Look at me. At me.” April remembers saying. 

Look at me. 

Because if she can get Sarah to focus on her and out of that terrifying memory of an event, things would calm down a bit.

So she rambles on and on until the curly haired brunette’s breathing begins to even out.

April can tell that Natalie is grateful that she took Sarah’s focus off of her. 

But it doesn’t mean that this isn’t one of the hardest things she’s ever done. 

Telling Sarah, who was already somewhat delicate to begin with, that everything was going to be fine.

Fine when they didn’t know who did this.

Didn’t even know if the person who did this was still out there.

April’s been up for over twenty four hours.

She doesn’t think she’s getting any meaningful sleep anytime soon.

… … … … …. … …. ….  
“Ms. Lockwood? I know this is hard, but I need you to answer my questions. Any information you can provide can help.”

Maggie looks away from the trio in the hospital room, wanting so badly to be with them, but having the confidence in April and Natalie to handle the situation on their own.

And she looks back to the detectives, Lindsay and Burgess, which to their credit are only trying to do their jobs.

Only trying to find out who did this.

“I don’t understand. I didn’t see anything until they brought her in. Shouldn’t you be asking Dr. Rhodes? He’s the attending in charge. He was first on the scene.”

Detective Lindsay looks at her with a sad smile, when she sees how thrown off balance Maggie is.

Calmly explains without objection. 

“It’s procedure to interview all those who might provide any useful information. We’ll talk to Rhodes when he’s done with his rotation.”

Maggie nods. Tearfully. Hastily. Blinking fast to clear the salt out of her eyes.

And the detectives continue on.

“Around eighty percent of all assault cases the perpetrator is usually someone the victim knows. Is there anyone you noticed spending a noticeable amount of time around. A colleague? A significant other?”

This time it is Detective Burgess asking the questions. 

And she can already tell that the brunette police officer is immediately going for the domestic violence angle.

Which under normal circumstances would have made some kind of sense. But she’s met Sarah’s boyfriend. That man couldn’t hurt a fly.

He couldn’t’ be the initiator in whatever happened here …  
He wouldn’t do that… 

Then she realizes who she sounds like.

Like every single other person who tries to justify a wifebeater because the community loves him and he has a good, respectable job. 

Like every other person who thought a good looking man with a medical degree couldn’t possibly beat on his girlfriend.

A wave of cold sweeps over her as a morbid realization pushes it’s way to the surface.

“You don’t think he had something to do with it?”

Burgess expresses her dissent, when she sees the nurse jumping to conclusions.

“Not necessarily, we’re just trying to establish a lay of the land. Was there anyone else?”

Maggie goes through her mental rolodex. 

Tries to remember each instance in which she came into contact with the young medical student.

Realizing with melancholy how little she knows about her friend outside of the hospital setting.

Then a moment sticks out from the rest, a disturbing memory, that she’d originally only thought was odd. Only thought was a little creepy.

“There was a patient who came to the hospital a while back. He- He was hooked on cocaine. There was a chance he might have been involved with- with…”

Detective Lindsay suddenly stood up a little bit straighter. Leant in a little more as she makes the same connection.

“Are you talking about the sex trafficking victim?”

The detective turns to her colleague before Maggie has a chance to answer.

Starts catching her up on the details.

And Maggie’s heart wallows in concern.

That case was supposed to be handled.

Sarah had been told by several people, including Dr. Charles, including the detective, including her…

To let it go.

To never get involved outside the hospital

And Sarah had agreed.

She had agreed.

And they never heard about him from her again.

In fact, they had never heard from him again.

So Maggie had just assumed.

But what if.

What if…

She looked away from the nursing station.

Back towards the hospital room.

Back towards those closed curtains. 

What if.  
…. …. … ….  
“Hey Sarah? How are you feeling?”

Rhodes says softly as he enters the hospital room.

He’s been steeling himself for this moment, since the surgery had ended.

Since he’d watched Will storm out.

The medical student is leaning heavily against April.

Her head against the shoulder of the nurse who’s stationed herself on the bed next to her.

It’s against protocol.

Nurses are never supposed to cross such private bounds.

But knowing how close the two are he doesn’t say anything.

And neither does she.

Instead those dark, hooded eyes bury themselves into the wall adjacent to him.

And when he looks at April expectantly, the nurse silently shakes her head.

So he continues. And pretends nothing is wrong. Pretends that everything is normal.

He notices that Natalie had written some notes down in the charts. 

Also against protocol, but he knows the situation. And he knows Natalie’s stubbornness.

So he let’s it go.

“The surgery went well. We stopped the bleeding. I see Natalie has already been in to check on you and the healing process seems to be getting started.”

There’s no response on her part.

Not when he addresses her directly.

Not when he steps closer to the cot.

Not even a glance.

As a trauma surgeon he’s seen this a lot.

The seeming unresponsiveness in his patients attitude and demeanor.

Experience doesn’t make it any easier.

“I’m just going to double check your stitches. Make sure they’re still healing properly.”

He slowly reaches for her scrubs. To get a view of the wound.

Neither miss the medical student visibly tense.

And Connor remembers the blood.

Pouring out of her. 

Dripping onto the floor.

Things are going to get worse before they get better.  
… …. …. …  
“I’m not at liberty to be handing out personal information about our doctors to other employees in the hospital. But considering that you’re her emergency contact and I hold high esteem for your as a colleague and friend.”

Sharon pauses.

“And the circumstances…”

Having made her decision, she hands him a brown manila folder.

“You get to read it, look at it all you want. But you remain in my office, and if I get wind of anything from the file drifting around the hospital… There will be disciplinary action. ”

The psychiatrist nods.

Dr. Charles had done his research between his breaks.

He knows now, why Reese has him down as her emergency contact.

She’s an only child.

A less than savory backstory.

Mother less than involved.

Father’s completely out of the picture.

It was interesting to realize how much didn’t know about his young protege.

How much she was able to keep a secret.

Disheartening as well.

He closes the folder. Puts it back on Sharon’s desk.

She looks at him sympathetically.

“That poor girl…” 

That poor girl.

He ambles away from the office. Down the hallway. Back to the emergency area.

He needs to see Sarah.

See how she’s handling things. 

Because people don’t usually handle muggings well.

No matter how resilient.  
.. …. …. …  
“Where were you?”

Will had been sulking.

Lurking in the on-call room.

Focusing on his charts, which he usually deemed a waste of time.

Living off the vending machine, because while he didn’t want to stay in the hospital, it was not his right to go home. 

“Will! Where were you?”

It’s Natalie. 

He doesn’t think she initially thought anyone was going to be in the room. 

She’s usually the most stoic of all of them. Ice queen and all that.

No one is ever supposed to see her that flushed. That flustered.

When she sees him though. She immediately starts yelling at him. 

“What? I was here!”

He yells back almost defensively, still amped up from the anger.

But she pushes him right back. Both verbally and physically. 

Then realizing what she’s done, Natalie recoils and apologizes ferociously.

Sinks down on to the couch. 

Not knowing what else to do, Will sits down next to her.

And the silence rules the room, until one of them dares to break it.

“You should have seen her Will. She sounded so scared.”

He sits rigidly next to her.

Remembers what the paramedics were yelling.

Remembers his blood soaked scrubs.

He looks at his hands now. 

How they wielded the scalpel.

How they carefully picked out the small serrated bits of metal.

“Have they… Have they found out anything more?”

A beat of silence. And Will already knows the answer.

“Maggie talked to Detective Lindsay. They’re looking into suspects. They don’t know anything for sure.”

He withers a bit at that.

For some reason he sees Reese as a kid sister.

For some reason everyone sees Reese as their kid sister.

It shouldn’t make any sense but it does. 

They sit in the silence for a while more.   
It isn’t a comfortable one.

“You should go see her, Will.”

Will shakes his head.

“She wouldn’t want to see me.”

Natalie scoffs. Then shakes her head sadly. 

“Familiar faces are always welcome.”  
… …. …  
Daniel Charles sees them even before he’s even completely entered the emergency room.

Detective Lindsay and Officer Burgess in the corner. Speaking with Connor.

Connor Rhodes.

The trauma surgeon, who was always able to maintain an aura of calm on the floor, even in the most stressful situations.

The trauma surgeon, who currently portrays a semblance of worry, fluster, and agitation at the same time.

It feels wrong to see him like this.  
The former most of the trio, Detective Lindsay, pulls him aside as he makes his way through the flurry of activity..

Asks him to perform a metal health assessment, because she doesn’t want to overwhelm her if it means causing more damage.”

The detective seems to know how much she’s asking. 

Seems to know that it’s not going to be that easy.

Knows that it’s almost never that easy.

But he shares the frustration.

And nods somberly at the detective anyway. 

When he enters, Sarah is alone in her hospital room.

And the room itself is shrouded in silence.

Only the swish of the curtains and the murmur of the hospital machines make themselves known as he enters.

But he doesn’t need his hearing to understand the whole picture.

The curtains are drawn, giving a semblance of darkness.

The monitoring devices loom over her, meant to save her, appearing the threaten her.

And the bruises have risen during the night, marking her olive skin with ugly purple stains.

Yes.

The picture is horrifying.

“How are you feeling, Dr. Reese?”

 

He starts with her professional name.

 

Wanting her to remember how important she is.

How smart and vital she was to the team.

Except Dr. Reese is cowering on the hospital bed.

Cowered so much that, she’s done all she can to face away from him.

Done all she can to not meet his eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

Sarah says it in a whisper. 

Hoarse, frail, and small from the events of the previous night.

“Sarah. You have nothing to apologize for.”

He says it firmly, calmly.

“I’m sorry.”

 

The phrase is thick, yet even more frail. Even more wobbly than the first time she said it. 

Like she’s trying not to cry.

The med student shakes vehemently, moving her free hand, the one that’s not being injected with intravenous fluids and medication, to cover her mouth.

Trying to smother whatever noise that tries to tear itself out.

“Sarah. You can look at me.”

The battered medical student visibly trembles as she turns further.

 

Shakily inhales and jerks her head back and forth in refusal.

 

“You can look at me Sarah.”

He says it softer this time, willing her to meet his eyes.

“I can’t… I can’t.”

She whimpers.

“This isn’t your fault.”

“Y-yes it is.” 

The med student gasps out.

“No… It isn’t.”

What’s left of her composure crumples.

“I should h-have listened. I should’ve listened. You said it. You said to-“

She can’t even get through a coherent sentence, before dissolving into tears.

Sarah’s a silent crier.

Nothing but salty trails streaking her face and shaky gasps as she tries to catch her breath.

It doesn’t make it any less sobering.

He reaches out for her hand, but she cringes away.

So Doctor Charles resigns himself to a comforting presence.

There if needed, but not to intrude. 

And as minutes tick by she refuses to look at him. Tries to push him away.

And when the nurse, one he doesn’t recognize, stops to see them, administers more morphine.

Dr. Charles knows it’s only a matter of time before she’s under.

He knows he’ll have to talk Detective Lindsay.

Inform her of the circumstances.

But Sarah doesn’t deserve to be alone.

She doesn’t need to be alone.

He’s interrupted by a soft knock on the door.

It’s Halstead. 

Looking more or less like a wounded puppy.

The blue-eyed doctor’s gives a half of a wave to him. 

And too Sarah, who’s dosage of morphine had begun to kick in. 

She should never have to be alone. 

She’s had enough of that in the past.


End file.
